When Active Ride Shop, one of the Village at Orange’s newest shops, went to mall management and said it wanted to bring in Tony Hawk for the grand opening, the folks at the mall were, in skateboard lingo, “stoked.”
“It’s kind of a once in a lifetime opportunity,” said Deena Henry, general manager. It’s also set to be one of the mall’s largest events ever. The Village is expecting about 3,000 to 5,000 people.
The mall holds an annual indoor police expo, which attracts about 25,000 to 40,000 people during four days, but it never has held a two-hour outdoor event with so many people.
“The crowd that Tony Hawk draws shouldn’t be a problem,” Henry said.
It’s a coup for the mall, which recently renovated and added a new restaurant section. It’s also a coup for Active Ride, an Ontario-based retailer, which sells surf, skate and snowboard gear, clothing and shoes.
Last year, Active opened at The Camp in Costa Mesa.
Erica Yary, who does marketing for Active Ride, said getting Hawk to do a demo at an Active store has been on her list for a long time.
In this case, relationships paid off. Yary is friends with Hawk’s Birdhouse skate team manager and suggested it to him. The team manager went to Hawk and he agreed.
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Village at Orange: skateboarder Tony Hawk coming to Active Ride debut |
The relationship between Active and Hawk goes back a long way, she said. There won’t be a signing.
“The line would be outrageous,” she said.
Plans are for Hawk and the Birdhouse team, which includes Brian Sumner, Willy Santos, Steve Nesser, Matt Ball, Sean Eaton, to do a demonstration on the vert ramp.
The ramp alone costs $5,000, Yary said. The whole event could cost upward of $20,000, Yary said.
But outside sponsors and other stores at the mall such as Chipolte are helping out, she said.
Now comes the hard part: putting the event together.
“I’ve never had so many people involved in a demo,” Yary said. “It’s pretty crazy.”
There are security issues, insurance and parking.
The city of Orange also is stoked. Mayor Mark Murphy is expected to ride his motorcycle out and introduce the team.
The mall plans to capitalize on the day. Many people don’t know about the new shops at the mall or haven’t been since its renovation. Plans for that day include a fashion show prior to the event, raffles, drawings and coupons for retailers at the mall.
In mall lingo: “It’s pretty big. We’re very excited,” Henry said.
Hispanic Auto-Buying II
Last week I wrote about how some local auto dealerships were advertising and marketing their businesses to Hispanic shoppers.
One source for the story, who got back to me this week for the article, had some interesting things to say about the darker side of selling cars.
David Medina founded the Houston-based National Automotive Hispanic Consumer Advocacy group because of a story told to him by his father, an immigrant from Spain.
The story was about how he went to a dealership to buy a car and was treated badly, he said.
“I’ve remembered that my whole life,” Medina said.
These days, Medina, whose group certifies dealerships that satisfy several conditions, said some auto dealers operate with the same disrespect that they gave his father.
Hispanic auto buyers often have targets on their heads, he said.
Medina said they often don’t understand the auto-buying process. Many buyers are taken into the dealership’s finance room and told they can get a loan at a rate that is way higher than the bank quotes, he said.
Fair practice is about 2% above the bank, he said. But some dealers will charge 15% for a loan when the bank is charging just 7%.
“It’s a disclosure issue,” Medina said.
Some dealers try to take advantage of the buyer’s lack of English.
“It’s poor business ethics,” he said.
Some dealers also push extra warranties on Hispanic buyers, telling them they can’t get a loan without one. That’s not true, he said.
Dealers can make thousands in profits on warranties. In many cases, the finance manager gets commission or incentives for selling warranties, he said.
Medina’s organization certifies auto dealers that have bilingual staff and fair lending practices, among other qualifications. The organization also checks dealerships’ record of lawsuits.
About 30% of the certification costs go to Hispanic scholarships, he said.
BMW Hire
Sam Chaalan is the new manager at Irvine BMW.
Chaalan took over from Michael Chadwick, the new vice president of operations for Irvine-based Shelly Automotive Group LLC. Chadwick now oversees five dealerships.
